Strange day. Strange night. No comment.
Ebm, lbh orjvyqre zr.
Author: Milan
In the spring of 2005, I graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in International Relations and a general focus in the area of environmental politics. In the fall of 2005, I began reading for an M.Phil in IR at Wadham College, Oxford.
Outside school, I am very interested in photography, writing, and the outdoors. I am writing this blog to keep in touch with friends and family around the world, provide a more personal view of graduate student life in Oxford, and pass on some lessons I've learned here.
Science, the environment, and development
Today’s seminar for the Global Economic Governance Program was really excellent, discussing the future of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. On the panel were Jon Cuncliffe, Paul Collier, and Ngaire Woods. Overall, I would say that they agreed more than they disagreed. They primarily identified and discussed two areas of interest: the global financial consequences of the emergence of China and India and the role the Bank and the Fund should play in assisting development within countries that are either stagnating, or finding themselves at the start of an awkward path to reasonable prosperity.
While there, I realized that development might be the missing factor for my thesis. Conversing with Peter Dauvergne by email, he has identified the incredible variety of work already being done in the field of science and environmental politics. I need more of a focus if I am to say something new. To focus on the scientific and environmental questions that exist within the two areas listed above might be a good way to move forward. It captures concerns like China’s growing need for energy and resources, as well as issues like the problems of desertification and lack of decent access to water in sub-Saharan Africa.
Potentially, this is a way of bringing a lot of reading I’ve been doing that is somewhat peripheral to both the program and my thesis back into line. I don’t think it would be wise to extent the topic to consider health, which is also a fascinating intersection between science and development, but to use development to create a balanced triad between science and environmental politics might lend direction and balance, without going off topic.
Dr. Dauvergne also suggested that I read the last few years worth of issues of Environmental Politics: the journal from the MIT Press which he edits, as well as a thesis entitled Advocates, Experts or Collaborative Epistemic Communities by Lindsay Johnson, an MA student of his.
Comments would be especially appreciated on this, since I need to present my preliminary research plan on Tuesday at 11:00am.
Of news and time management
When corresponding with friends back in Canada, I am frequently reminded about how out-of-touch with national news I have become while in the UK. For me, the Harper government is a distant and largely hypothetical possibility, still in the stasis of post-electoral uncertainty. I remembering wandering around surprised on the night of the election, finding it difficult to comprehend how a party that had been in power for all the time I had been aware of politics could suddenly be outed. It is still that general sense that dominates my intuitive perspective on the present Canadian political situation. That and the fervent hope that we don’t descend into the insanity of social crusading and fiscal and strategic recklessness that have taken hold so ominously and harmfully in the United States.
I don’t think there is much I can plausibly do to keep in touch beyond skimming the Globe and Mail website and Google News Canada every day or so. Between reading for the core seminar and thesis reading, I already have a great deal to do. I am frequently frustrated by the impossibility of doing as well as can be managed in all possible areas. It makes you constantly guilty when you aren’t doing something classed as productive (course reading, scholarship applications) or semi-productive (cycling, reading The Economist). Also, it is the conversations you have with friends about current events that are the ultimate spur to be knowledgeable about them. Without debate tournaments or pub and living room arguments about Canadian politics, my lack of knowledge is rarely revealed. While Emily seems to be powerfully in touch with Canadian news – perhaps her time at Goldman Sachs taught her how to do so when busy and abroad – nobody else is likely to bring up current Canadian events as a topic of conversation.
The solution is to work towards squeezing out all activities that are not at least semi-productive, eliminating the gaps that make you feel as though you’re not doing as much as you should be. Once you are doing more-or-less all you can be, you can be forgiven for some oversights. Everything I do should be part of some plan or project.
That said, I am going to get back to reading about AIDS.
Zip, ziltch, nada – on the work front
Last night, I was up absurdly late. I remember hearing the clock tolling six as I covered my eyes with cloth in a late attempt to fall asleep. Understandably, my productivity today took a bit of a hit as the result of such sleeplessness.
After attempts at reading, and the completion of yet another scholarship application, I walked to the Port Meadow with Nora this evening – in time to see the sun set behind the western tree line.
Today was a good day, all told. I got to read the first few pages of Kelly’s novel about the Picts. I also got to have a conversation in French, do some cycling, correspond with a distant colleague about the thesis, and read.
Tomorrow afternoon, I am attending a seminar entitled: “Is there a future for the IMF and World Bank?” at Merton College.
I saw a Canon A700 at the pub tonight. There is definitely a lot more glass included in the lens, possibly making the 800 ISO setting viable. The LCD screen is also much larger. Does anyone have personal experience with one?
The Colbert Report: Better Know a District: Georgia’s 11th District is brilliant
The Constant Gardener
I saw The Constant Gardener with the European Film Society tonight. I found the film to be very powerful, and thoroughly dispiriting. While the specific evils portrayed are obviously fictional, there is a grim plausibility that accompanies them. Humanity has a long way to go.
The pharmaceutical plot was actually the weakest part of the film. Not to spoil it for anyone, but you can’t license a drug in the rich world on the basis of unsupervised clinical trials in Africa. That said, the portrayal of machine-gun wielding horsemen terrorizing villagers in the Sudan is probably quite accurate. Hopefully, it induced at least a bit of reflection on the part of various audiences about the moral responsibilities people in the developed world bear towards those elsewhere facing genocide or other forms of large-scale violence. Likewise, some of the depictions of the horrific toll of AIDS formed part of the realistic backdrop for the film.
Appropriately enough, immediately before the film started, I began reading the copy of Race Against Time that my mother sent me, along with some extra illumination for my bike. Written by Stephen Lewis, it is a printed version of the Massey Lectures that were delivered across Canada, and it opens with the line: “I have spent the last four years watching people die.”
I will probably finish it tomorrow, then lend it to Emily. I feel as though I should say more, but I am thoroughly overwhelmed.
Oxford exploration
This morning, I was woken by the 9:00am booming of our local clock tower. Since it was already the time when I was meant to meet Sheena and Emily to start the Oxford tour for Martin Ziguele, the former Prime Minister of the Central African Republic, I had to roll straight out of bed and into a suit: arriving outside St. Antony’s at six past nine.
The tour itself was very generic: Christ Church meadows, the Radcliffe Square, and up Parks Road. One notable sight was an actually Greylag gosling, beside the Isis. It was your stereotypical yellow puffball, and the parents visibly and audibly disapproved of my attempts to photograph it. Emily and I made efforts to describe things in French, where feasible, and impart some of the anecdotal Oxford history that gets absorbed by all students here.
In the afternoon, I took another bike ride out into the village-strewn countryside surrounding Oxford. This time, I headed southward, across Magdalen Bridge and way down the Cowley Road. I went past the BMW plant at the end of the Cowley Road, then up the hill near Garsington (N51 43.191, W001 09.678). From Church Walk to there and back is 22km.
He hill didn’t offer as nice a view as the hills around Bath did, but it was nonetheless the most pronounced elevation I’ve climbed near Oxford. In response to Tristan’s post requesting top speeds, I made an attempt to see how fast I could go before my gears became more or less useless, on a slight downslope in the countryside south of Oxford. I managed 48.2km/h, which isn’t bad for a bicycle.
PS. I need to remember to email Peter Dauvergne about my thesis idea. Since I need to go a presentation on it in our methods seminar next Tuesday, I need to have a decent idea of the important methodological questions involved.
Letters
After long delay, I dispatched my response to Alison’s letter today. Indirectly, doing so was a reminder of the sheer number of important, interesting people who are out there to keep in touch with. There are even many fellow Oxford students who I see much less than I would like. Thankfully, there have also been reminders of late that even those with whom I lack contact for extended periods do not become entirely alienated from me as a result. At different times, Kate, Viktoria P, and Sarah W have all been reminders of this. To know that is comforting to someone off-continent from family and the bulk of friends.
I also finished re-reading Dune today. I read it for the first time during the first Bowron Lakes expedition, many years ago, with Alison Benjamin and my friend Chevar. Back then, I remember finding it very long and difficult, though enjoyable. It’s certainly a book with extensive verisimilitude. Herbert does an impressive job of constructing a whole universe for it to take place within: complete with politics, history, and religion. Like all the best science fiction, the themes of Dune speak to enduring human concerns and possibilities.
Disjointed thoughts
I don’t really know what to say about today, so I will talk about something more general instead. This term, it seems as though we are being presented with our first opportunity to take some initiative. That’s to say, elements of the workload are less focused on the completion of specific tasks and more tuned towards the advancement of general research. If I move quickly and find the right people, this might be a chance to step up involvement with the Environmental Change Institute. After today, I feel as though I need to be more aggressive in my questioning, when it comes to my thesis topic. In particular, I need to consider the very limited nature of some of the case studies I am considering. To say something really important, I need to do more.
Having just come back from the strategic studies dinner and presentation, I find myself hopelessly muddled. Somehow, it all combined to confuse things that had seemed fairly clear before. I am sorry to be vague, but I can’t even really comment on what’s eliciting such opaque responses. Since I need to be up early, I will read some Kerouac and go to sleep, rather than really contemplating it now. It feels like an idea that needs time to cook.
Emily and I set off fairly early tomorrow morning.
Preliminary QT results
This afternoon, in the exam schools, twenty-five names were posted on the board: results for our qualifying test. Since there are 28 people in the program, that means that three people have either asked not to have their names displayed or failed.
I was among the twenty-one who are known to have passed. Among the twenty-five listed, there are also four distinctions. I am told this is the highest number in at least five years. Last year, there were two. My energetic congratulations to Iason, Bryony, Matthew, and Robert Wood. The three unknowns could be any combination of passes, fails, and distinctions.
We will have numeric grades posted to us sometime in the next few days. Since the results are now officially in, I have re-posted the three questions that I chose to answer.
PS. On an unrelated note, Emily and I are meant to give a tour of Oxford to Martin Ziguele, Former Prime Minister of the Central African Republic, tomorrow morning. Tonight, he is presenting before the Strategic Studies Group, meaning I will be having dinner with him, Sheena, and Claire in New College.
Technical difficulties
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to post anything for today. Firstly, that’s because I was unusually busy. Secondly, my internet connection at Church Walk has failed: probably because I don’t have user credentials at St. Antony’s and they reviewed network access at the start of the term. Hopefully, I can sort that out today, along with learning how I did on the QT and picking up my bike from the first month maintenance that Beeline Cycles includes with bikes they sell.
Despite having no time to get into details (I need to finish a presentation on the importance of nuclear weapons to the Cold War staying cold), I can assert that yesterday was an excellent day.